Michael bent down, his rich dark hair tied to a taut bun behind the head. He crushed the blackened stalk between his fingers, brittle as straw and slimy in the centre, stinking a sweet mouldy scent like old green-stained bread. The fields of Ingval had betrayed their farmers once more, and he wondered how many more winters the village could endure.
Mayor Lenus, a round stubbly man, lit his old pipe and huffed a puff to clear his head. The familiar acrid smoke blew at Michael’s direction. They stood on a hill overlooking the village with a handful of other men as the sun began its descent into the cool ocean. The last warm rays of the day disappeared slowly behind the trees.
“How much?” Lenus asked, his belly sticking out from under the worn burgundy coat.
“A quarter of the yield was infected, ser. And also the fields. It was much less last year,” the tall farmer Michael reported, ledger in hand. His timbre low and restrained.
Lenus responded with disbelief on his brows. This strange new mould appeared last year. How was it already everywhere? He turned to his assistant, gesturing for him to pull up the numbers from before.
The man’s wrinkled fingers caressed the pages, and they spoke true. Yield went down from last year’s harvest. They tried everything they could to get rid of it but to no avail.
And to the Mayor’s dismay, this year’s yield could barely feed the town, let alone fill up the Capital city’s quota. He was running out of time, and his job was on the line here. Most of their harvest from last year went to fill the silos.
The skirmishes against the Farcian rebels on Petraselia — an island to the West, had been going for quite too long. Grains had always been a precious commodity on the islands; now, even more so with this mould rotting their produce.
The Mayor pinched the bridge of his nose as he breathed a sigh of defeat. From a distant hill, chiming into his ear was laughter from a bunch of teens playing next to the town’s windmill. Among them was Lucian, the assistant’s son. He was the loudest and oldest of them all, who, the mayor recalled, was turning 19 this year.
A ripe age for the Academy, not to mention the boy was growing into a fine young man thanks to all the farm work. Spiky short hair, dark as the night like his parents. Michael’s genes had apparently given up because the boy wasn’t even half as tall compared to his old man. One peculiar thing stood out; the magic in him turned his eyes a deep violet, something he got all to himself.
Lenus imagined the castle far away in the Capitol, westward. The Academy of Libraria, the most prestigious organisation on this island, nay, on the whole archipelago, had long sought after magically gifted students.
They granted a hefty sum for each student sent there to study. Auster village from across the strait got enough money for a whole slew of new farming mechs for them boys they sent there since last quota. The mayor recalled with a smile on his face, and Lucian was certainly not lacking in the magic department.
“Michael, how old is your son?” the Mayor perused, seeking confirmation.
“My Luke? T’would be his 19th this fall, ser.”
“He took after his momma, huh?” he said in jest, knowing full well Lucian didn’t inherit his father’s stature.
“You’re right on that, ser,” Michael chuckled under his breath, awaiting the Mayor’s next line as he stood in front of him and put up a friendly smile.
Over on the yonder hill across the babbling stream, Lucian, the assistant’s son, was just wrapping up his little afternoon chinwag with his peers. A band of kids Lucian managed to befriend throughout his years. He was their de facto ‘leader’; by age, he was the oldest. He was also the only one with magic. His tricks and the occasional jests he pulled on the village people had earned him the ire of elders. But more importantly to him, the adoration of the young ‘uns.
“Luke! Come on! Do it again, man!” A boy around Lucian’s age called Mark demanded.
“Okay, but only once more!”
The young boy focused, stretched out his hand, and let the magic flow. The vibrations coursed through every muscle fibre from Lucian’s body, through the open country air and upwards from under young Mark’s feet.
He lifted up as if gravity had reversed on the boy. The cheering and laughter erupted around them as young Mark performed all sorts of goofy poses in mid-air. A swimming dog, a woman with her dress blown up by a draft, a bizarre adventurer with a penchant for the drama.
They ran behind Lucian as he tried his best to lower the gravity field, letting Mark down. He had to be extra careful. Magic ran strong in him, as Michael explained when an accident happened in the past. But he had been practising really hard, and Mark’s gentle swan-like touchdown was clear proof of that. All the kids cheered him on.
“Luke! Luke! Luke!” they shouted his name as they all came marching home. The air around Lucian smelled burnt, residue from the magic, but the children had gotten used to it already.
On their path, halfway through the village by the old stone bridge, a truck came rolling in. Deep green tarp over the cargo bed, held up like a tent by thin metal frames. It solemnly trudged into town like a wounded beast limping on its last leg. Heavy, ashy rubber tyres crunched against the cobblestones, stopping before the town’s fountain and marketplace. Lucian stopped dead in his tracks while the others continued on, running after the truck.
The others from the market gathered next to it, forming a crowd as the shadow of the Sun fell over town. ‘It’s the Academy! They returned from the frontiers.’ Some women were running, dresses bundled up in hand to tell the other villagers to hurry. Lucian saw a soldier sitting in the bowel of the truck, face hollowed like an old man’s. He recognised the man.
It was Elliot Taylor, the neighbours’ eldest son, five or six years ahead of Lucian. The boy remembered when Elliot was still hanging out with them all before the day he smiled goodbye and headed to the frontiers. And now he was back. Well… most of him. He was holding something… a box. A box wrapped in deep red cloth.
Red was a bad colour for people of the islands. It was an omen. It meant blood not where it should be. It meant death.
The truck stopped, and Lucian stood behind the crowd of spectators. He watched as Mrs. Taylor, Elliot’s mother, almost tripping on a stone as she rushed to his side. Elliot hurried off the truck and also tripped, not from a rock but from the lack of a left leg. The others followed. One dropped down to help Elliot up and into his weeping mother’s arms.
He clutched the red box tightly to his chest and refused to let go, even as his last leg was failing to support him. Amputation was a popular treatment with front line doctors, and Elliot was one of the lucky few to have lost only a leg. The others had bandages all over. Victims of the occasional encounters with the dogged Farcians extremists. Despite the fact that the attacks had so far been scattered and unorganised, the damage was terrible all the same.
“Some day I’ll be a soldier!” Mark said, not too loud but not quiet either. Sudden, out of the blue, uncalled for, and inappropriate. Those words sounded like a grenade going off right next to Lucian.
“What?” Lucian turned. He could barely believe in what he’d just heard. “What did you just say?”
“I said I’m gonna be a soldier. They need the help.”
Lucian’s mouth twitched, but he bit back his tongue. War was a touchy subject. “You don’t want that life, Mark,” he replied.
“Why not?”
“Aren’t you worried you’d end up like Elliot?” Lucian gestured at the soldier limping next to his mother, discreetly, of course. They were approaching an old man, ol’ Vert. Kind man, likes to brag to others about his only son.
Elliot handed the red box over to him, hands shaking like a tree in the storm. The old man said nothing. Trembling, he hugged the box into his chest and closed his eyes. He nodded thank you to Elliot for bringing… whatever remained of his son back to him. And they quietly retreated from the fanfare.
“No,” Mark protested, jolting Lucian’s attention back. “Elliot is as sharp as a donkey. Probably did something wrong. My uncle goes to the front lines every year, and he’s still fine!”
“You idiot,” Lucian grumbled. “You’d die before you even have a chance to look at what killed you. Stay home with your ma.”
“Oh yeah? What about you then? Think you’d do better?” Mark attested.
Lucian said nothing. He looked at Mark, then turned to Elliot again for a moment, and simply left. Some of the soldiers came back with medals, and the villagers were ecstatic. Their cheers and mirth disappeared slowly as he left the town square and headed home.

✦✦✦

The sky was already dark on his way home, a canvas of stars twinkling their way across the heavens. Lucian twisted his fingers and tried his best to shake off what Mark had said earlier.
Joining the Academy? Yeah… I’d rather die… Hmm, same thing really. He thought.
But the thought in his head wasn’t given the chance to form fully. Wafting out from the window of the lovely old watermill he called home was the warm and inviting scents of spices. Nutmeg, curry, thyme, and cinnamon were wrapping themselves in onions and the musk of mutton chops.
It was his mother’s stew, something he had grown to love the older he became, much like his father. Not long now until he gets to savour it by spoonfuls. His home was just ahead, on top of a small hill by the mountain feet.
The steady stream from deep inside the mountain flowed into a little idyllic pond and the family had stayed in the watermill ever since Lucian was a little boy. Courtesy of the villagers and the mayor. On the condition that Michael would work the mill and keep it functional.
Lucian came up to the front door, so ready to taste his mother’s cooking. The smell of it through their open window almost made all that field work that morning worth it. He nudged the door in, carefully not to break it like last time, and walked into their living room, kitchen space, and dining room all in one.
“Hey ma, hey dad!” Lucian greeted them with a smile.
“Hi sweetie! Sit! Dinner’s ready.” His mother replied. “Honey! Lucian’s home! Come get dinner!”
“Is that… mutton?” Lucian pulled out the chairs and put down the dishes as usual.
“Yes! I made your favourites!” His mother said with a glee in her voice.
“Hey, little one,” Lucian’s dad came to the table. His long dark mane wrapped itself around his neck. Michael pulled out one of the chairs and sat down.
“Hey dad, how was the meeting with the mayor?”
“Ah. Good, t’was good,” Michael looked over to his wife at the sink. “Though…The mould is back again, worse than last time.”
“Again!? I thought we got rid of it?” Confusion glazed over Lucian.
“Yeah… it only shows inside the crops. We thought we got rid of it but…” He looked to his wife, still stirring the pot. “Well, we didn’t.”
“Well, now it’s not time for these sorts of things, right boys?” Mother walked over to the table, a whole pot of steaming onion, potato, mutton stew in her hands.
“Mmhmm, well eat up, boy, you have a big day ahead of you tomorrow,” Michael quickly dropped the topic to focus on the modest stew pot that his son adored as if it was made with the best of the best ingredients out there.
“Wha… What day is it? Are we going somewhere?” Lucian asked while ladling the bowl under him a good helping of delicious stew.
His parents glanced over together for a fraction of a second but he saw it. Michael took a shallow breath, not for lack of wanting to breathe deeper.
“You’re going to the Academy, son!” They said it with a smile on their face, so sweet yet so out of place.
“Wait… what?” Lucian couldn’t believe what he had just heard. “You mean the army? I’m… I’m sorry but… what?”
“Your mother and I have been talking… and we think it could be good for you,” Michael explained, a strange new apathy present in his tone.
“N—no, I-I don’t want this!”
“It’s a big school! Not like the one we have here. They could help you there!” said Michael.
“What… What did I do wrong? Ma?” Lucian pleaded for an explanation.
In all his wildest, most unhinged nightmares, this one was the worst of them all to him. His own loving parents, sending him off to war, to die and Lucian refused it, refused to believe what he had just heard.
“No, you haven’t done anything wrong, love. It’s just… this is—”
“It’s been decided, little one,” father said, calm like a lake in winter, completely unlike him.
The woman averted her eyes, clenching her jaw in the process.
“It’s time, boy, time for you to become a real man,” Michael interjected. “Discipline, t’will be good for you.”
Those words ring like death bells to his ears. Was it because of his magic? No… It can’t be, was it because of…
“N, no! I, I don’t understand! Why are you forcing this? Why?” Lucian shot up from his chair, slamming his fist on the table.
Just then, a mystical wave of force bent the light around as it radiated outward from him. It threw everything flying away from the dining table. Pots and plates crashed against the walls, cutlery scattered amongst stew and food strewn about on the floor.
A tidy home turned into a scene in a matter of seconds. Much to his parents’ plight, the boy was prone to outbursts of magic like this. Ever since he was little. Much, much more so than other children his age if they exhibited magic.
There was something wrong with him. Some villagers would often say.
Doors ripped out of their frames, tools broke clean in his hands. Lucian’s control over his own magic was so poor that it was almost non-existent.
Michael looked at their trashed living room in abject disbelief and his wife could only burst into tears. Drops of stew dripped loudly from their dented pot lying in the corner of their home. He turned to Lucian, brown eyes burned an angry flame. Lucian knew he went too far and flinched backward.
Michael closed the distance between them in seconds, towering over his son. He slapped the boy so hard that Lucian stumbled to the ground. Blood dripped from his ruptured eardrum.
Lucian struggled to stand up. His face, blank with horror and confusion. His eyes, blurry from the shock. Thoughts were ringing as wind-chimes in a storm. He put his trembling hand over the warm spot on his ear and it was wet and slimy. He looked down at the reddened fingers in disbelief. Father had gotten angry before, but not like this, never like this.
Michael stood still, as if caught in a trance. He looked down at his shaking hand and squeezed it still.
Mother swooped down to hold her child in her arms. She screamed something but it was unclear. Only bubbling noises filled Lucian’s mind right now. The boy leaned on his mother’s shoulder to stand up and looked at his home, at his tiny world. Broken into pieces completely in mere moments.
Lucian never thought his parents would send him away like this. What did he do wrong? Because he broke the door last month? Because Emmel’s parents were still mad about the incident all those years ago? Why? Lucian looked at his father. A man he knew all his life to be calm and collected. The same man just broke his ear drum.
What had happened earlier that day?
Lucian looked at his mother’s face, suspended in this claustrophobic moment, the woman’s long braid was messy, more so than usual, she knew from the beginning, her apron knot was loose.
That was why she made the stew, in hopes of making the news go down easier. Lucian couldn’t breathe, not here, not right now, his stomach churned inside, squeezing his heart so tight it could burst. Lucian eyed the door, he needed to leave, he didn’t know where, just anywhere but here.
The boy lunged at the door, but Michael stood in front of him. A stern look painted the man’s face. The old man liked to wear his hair in a bun, something Lucian never paid much attention to, but now Michael’s hair was down. It had been down ever since they sat down for dinner. Locks of dark hair covered the pained expression on his face.
Lucian reached for the door knob. But his father gripped his wrist like a vice.
“Stop!” He commanded, a low growling voice. Lucian yanked his hand away as Michael continued. “Go pack your stuffs, they’ll come to pick you up tomorrow.”
Lucian envisioned the grim truck coming here the next morning. A cold antagonising bench waiting for him to sit in like a prisoner. As far as he was concerned, his life was over. And so, in a bid to fight for his freedom, Lucian bolted at the door, only for Michael to push him back down.
But this time, Lucian didn’t stop, he stomped up and pushed against his father. They jumped at each other like dogs fighting over nothing, disregarding mother’s crying pleas for them to stop.
“I just want a normal life!” Lucian screamed at the top of his lungs.
At this point, Michael had enough of this disrespect, and he shouted. “And I just wanted a normal son! But we don’t just magically get what we want now, do we? THAT’S LIFE! THE SOONER YOU LEARN THAT THE BETTER!”
“Michael!” Mother screamed at dad, dress crumpled between her fingers. Her eyes bloodshot and damp with tears. Michael looked at her, anger mixed with regrets webbed across his features.
Lucian stood back in horror. This was the man that taught him everything he knew; that laughed with him through his childhood; who taught him to ride horses and tie shoelaces. Dad inched forward, fist clenched and slightly shivering. There were battles being fought on his face and behind his quivering, reddened eyes.
“Michael! Stop!” Lucian’s mother held her son in her arms, pleading. “My sweet, listen to your father please I’m begging you! I’ll explain later. But right now you need to calm down, love, alright? Calm, child.”
Lucian was caught in a trance. His father’s words were ringing in his mind like a train running over every little happy memory he had. His mother’s face was wrecked with tears and… and… he couldn’t register anything else. Right now, all he cared about was to run away. And that was exactly what he did…
Lucian yanked away from his mother and lunged towards the door, mind focused on that singular purpose. His eyes flared up a mystical purple. They were burning, from the tears? Or from the magic. He didn’t know, and didn’t care.
Michael rushed up to stop him and in instinct, Lucian raised his hand up to push his father away from the door.
Just then…
The tips of his fingers were burning, his skin sizzling in a tingling sensation, they were glowing. Michael was facing those outstretched fingers, staring down his terrified son in horrible realisation. Lucian’s mind screamed for his own body to stop. But…
Blood splattered onto the wall and the door, staining them in a spiralling crimson. Lucian stared through the hole in Michael’s chest cavity before the man collapsed onto the floor. Complete silence engulfed the family. Ashen purple smoke lingered on Lucian’s finger.
Oh no… Gods no, please don’t let this be real!
Mother’s scream was the only sound filling Lucian’s remaining ear as he ran away from the house in terror.
His heart was screaming for him to stop but Lucian’s feet kept running. The sky above shone with a billion stars watching over him. He ran as far as his feet would take him, into the great unknown of the night, into the dark woods across the bridge towards Fort Liguras and the Academy beyond it.
And into the murky future that awaited him.